


A Fortunate Ending

by Midnight675



Category: A Series of Unfortunate Events (TV)
Genre: Family, Fluff, found family trope, honestly i just wanted a happy ending so I made one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-17
Updated: 2019-04-17
Packaged: 2020-01-15 17:09:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18503362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Midnight675/pseuds/Midnight675
Summary: I decided to write a happier ending for the series to give myself some closure and that happier ending mostly consisted of Lemony Snicket encountering the Baudelaires on Briny Beach when they land for the 4th time and finding a new family. It is a very happy ending so if that's not what you are here for I suggest you find another fic.*This is also posted on my writing Tumblr One-shot-through-the-heart





	A Fortunate Ending

I have spent many years of my life in the pursuit of certain tales that would haunt the mind and chill the soul. The knowledge of the unfortunate events surrounding the three incredibly intelligent children of my now lost love have been my burden to carry. Many an hour of my life has been spent bent over a desk reliving the terrors they had to endure after their parents were lost in a terrible fire. The story was bleak, the kind of story to make you lose all hope in finding anyone alive at the end much less happy. Yes, the Baudelaire orphans lived an utterly arduous life but, as is sometimes likely to happen when one is smart but without luck for a long period of time, there did finally come a time where the tides turned, a term here meaning a reversal of fortune. For example when a man loses his job only to win the lottery the next day, or when a boat on the sea carrying four orphans suddenly changes course leading them toward a beach where a certain former volunteer happened to be watching.

On that fateful day, I was retracing the then cold case of the Baudelaires for the third time looking to turn up new information. I had arrived on Briny Beach with low spirits and little hope, only to find a new hope floating just on the horizon. The stories I am about to retell to you are not like my works in the past. By reading this you will not be stripped of joy or left so distraught that you cannot go on, no, these stories are quite the opposite. These are stories of new beginnings, of found families, and of safe havens among outcasts. This is once again the story of the Baudelaires and the newly adopted Snicket, but this time they are saved, adopted by a man who had lost the rest of his family in the same conflict they had. The one who happened to find them out on that beach years after they had disappeared from the world. 

When the four first washed up on the gloomy shore I was reluctant to approach them. I simply watched as the orphans I had studied for years unloaded onto the grey sand for, I came to find out, the fourth time. 

Their boat was tattered and seemed to be leaking ever so slightly. 

“We are lucky that The Beatrice made it this far yet, it feels like a bad omen to end up back on this beach again,” Violet commented as she helped little Beatrice, now an energetic toddler, onto the beach. This was the first time I saw my niece. Klaus, who was making sure the boat would not drift back into the sea, answered her.

“At this point, I’m fairly certain that our luck can't get any worse. I wouldn't worry about the implications.” Violet looked at Klaus sadly in agreement and softly set Beatrice on the ground so she and the others could unload what little supplies they had left after their lengthy trip. 

It was at this point that I was discovered when the now fluent Sonny climbed out of the boat to sit with Beatrice and spotted me across the beach. She began to silently signal her siblings before I realized I had been found. Though I was still standing a whales length away from them I could see all four heads turn to face me as they took notice of the stranger watching them from afar. At this point, it would have been customary for me to introduce myself, as one should always do when you are found out for watching others who may not know who you are, lest they take you for some kind of threat to their health, but before I could think of the words the eldest Baudelaire approached me and found her own words.

“Are you Lemony Snicket?” She asked the question cautiously and made a point of stopping just out of my reach while her siblings waited safely by The Beatrice. 

“I am.” The answer did not seem to bring any relief to Violet’s stiff features. “Sonny recognized you from a picture of VFD before the schism. Our parents wrote about you in a book once too, you were a trusted friend. Is this still true?” It was agonizing to hear the apprehension in her voice but knowing her history it was not surprising. When a child goes through what the Baudelaire's went through they have every reason not to trust random men on beaches, even if they are old confidants of their parents. I understood this because I knew all that they had lost each time they trusted a volunteer, but I wanted to do what I could to make up for what they had lost. My dearest Beatrice would have wanted them to be safe, so I did the best I could to show I was trustworthy. She had asked if it was still true that I was a trusted friend, I told the truth and hoped for the best.

“It is.” I answered, “I understand that you have been through a lot of grief since your parents perished in that fire and have been double-crossed many times by those your parents once trusted, but I can promise you that there are not enough sugar bowls in the world to make me turn away from your parents and that dedication passes on to you Violet, and all your siblings. I have been trying to find you since you disappeared at the last safe place. I have followed everything that has happened to you. I want to help you Baudelaires. ” Violet said nothing, only looked back and nodded to Klaus who led the rest of the children to join the conversation. When they had arrived Violet conveyed to the others that I was indeed who they assumed me to be.

“Mr. Snicket, these are my siblings,” Violet started to introduce them but I stopped her. 

“No need, I know who you are. Violet, the eldest Baudelaire who has a knack for inventing, Klaus, the middle child and researcher of the family, and of course Sonny, the youngest with a talent for the culinary arts.” They stood a little straighter at hearing their titles as my focus fell on Beatrice. “but this one, I don't recall in my research”

The pride the Baudelaires had experienced the moment before evaporated before my eyes, as most good things for them did at that time, and was instead replaced by the suffocating memory of sadness from their past and a realization of a harsh truth they would have to convey. Perhaps you have been privileged enough to have lived a life where you have never had to tell someone that someone they cared for is dead, and if you have I cannot explain to you what goes through your head but it was all going through the Baudelaires heads that day. The day they told me, Kit, thought lost to the ocean, had indeed lived to see land and have her baby, only to be taken by the carelessness of the man she had once loved. 

“I see,” I remarked, pensively, when they had finished reciting the dreadful truth. Klaus was the first to attempt to comfort me, as decent people do.

“We’re very sorry for your loss Mr. Snicket-”

“Please, call me Lemony”

“Of course...Lemony, we did everything we could for Kit but by the time she had Beatrice, it was too late to save her.” A very deep sadness settled on that beach as often happened when the Baudelaires visited it. Earlier in my writings, I explained how I could not describe what it felt like to lose someone if you have never experienced it, there is a similar experience when you have lost someone and find someone else who knows how that feels. There is a deep understanding between these types of people, like that of the bond between two longtime friends or a parent and their child, an instant and complete understanding of each other that goes far beyond any comfort you could receive from another. This was a connection that the Baudelaires had made with Beatrice and it was one that they, in this moment, made with me. This, I suspect, is why I was not refused when I implored, a word here meaning to piteously beg for something one desperately needs, them to let me hold Beatrice.  
She was still small but already clearly intelligent and extremely affectionate.She smiled at me and for the first time that day there was a ray of sunshine on that cloudy beach. Her eyes sparkled like her mothers and like our mothers before her, a sight that was of great comfort to me. Carefully I set her onto the sand and put my attention back on the Baudelaires. I was suddenly very aware of the tears gathering in my eyes. I composed myself long enough to extend a proposal. 

“Baudelaires, long ago now I offered to take you away to safety in that taxi cab.” I motioned to the cab I had arrived in that was parked near the trolly stop, “I extend the same offer to you now and I beg you to take it. I still can only offer a life on the run but I can promise you safety from any villains who may still be out there. I once knew your mother very well, what kind of a friend would I be to her if I did not do what I could for her children” 

“You would be better off than the others” Klaus answered grimly, “you would still be alive”

The edge on his voice cut through the conversation carrying all of the guilt Klaus had likely been holding onto since the carnival where he and his sisters had been forced to watch a woman who had helped them, plummet to her death into a tiger pit. The same guilt came across Violet's face and even Sonny seemed upset. 

“We’re bad luck,” Sonny confessed. 

“Well then,” I bent down to match her eye level and smiled, “you four and I have that in common. We will be in great company” The words did little to convince them. I stood to face them all again and saw how deeply their faces were weighed down by their past. I wanted to help but wasn't sure how to convince them to let me. I was contemplating words when, once again, Violet filled the silence.

“ We will come with you” Klaus shot her a confused and alarmed glance which she met with a look that seemed to say wait and finished with a qualifier. “We will go with you, to lunch, or something of the like. If you truly wish us to come with you, we need to know who you are first. I want to trust you Lemony, but you can understand our situation I'm sure.” I did, and I agreed.

And so, it was decided, over greasy diner food and root beer floats, that I was to be given the chance. As I have stated and proved, over the years I have learned a great amount about the Baudelaires but nothing compared to being able to converse with them. It is a strange feeling when you meet someone for the first time, or nearly, and know everything about them, but they know nothing of you. At first, I took special steps to tell them everything I felt they should know. VFD was dead now, there was no point in keeping anything from them anymore, but, as I found out, that's not what they really wanted to know about. 

“With all due respect Lemony,” Klaus interrupted. “We would really rather hear about you..” My bewilderment must have shown, for Violet was quick to support her brother's point. 

“What Klaus means is, we have had many guardians to watch over us in the past, not all of them kind, and we want to know what type you are. It is very kind of you to offer to take us in, and it would be very helpful to have someone to watch out for us, but at the same time, I am 18 now and therefore should be able to protect my siblings on my own if need be. If we don't know that we can trust you we may choose to go elsewhere alone and continue to find our own safe life.” Violet was very formal and she had been very formal the whole time that I had been talking to her. There was a guard up somewhere in her soul and it was preventing me from making a good impression. 

As if I was not in the conversation Sonny began to argue with Violet's reasoning. 

“But we cannot go back” By this, she was, of course, referring to going back to a normal life., to rejoin the world as normal citizens. They had been through so much (and technically were wanted for so many crimes) that it would be next to impossible for them to go back to being normal people. Even if they managed to settle themselves there was always the threat of rival volunteers seeking them out. They, like me, had no choice but to keep running. What it came down to was just whether they would do it with me or not. 

Violet pondered on this for a moment. It was a very miserable ponder. Eventually, after she didn't speak Klaus directly addressed me and asked if he and his sisters could have a moment to talk alone. I conceded to his very reasonable request and went to pay for the meal. What the orphans spoke of they have never told me. Parts of the discussion have come out over the years, there were mentions of their parent's trust in me and of lost guardians but I never truly did figure out what it was that Sonny said that day that made her siblings stop and fall deep into thought. I watched from the counter as her words seeped into their brains and tilted the odds in my favor. I don't know if the comment was something complex like a known story from my past where I had been a savior or if it was something as simple as the idea that my brothers taxi would be a great perk, all I know is when I came back to the table the contemplative energy from before was gone. The four (though Beatrice was so small I doubt she had much input) had made a decision. 

From that day forward I became the unofficial, official guardian of the Baudelaires. By this, I mean that there was no legal paperwork tying me to any of them, no bank man to put them in my care, but there was an agreement amongst those involved that we would stay together. Now, as the children are not children anymore, we are not always together but as we are all still on the run, we find ourselves together often enough. When one has very few friends in the world it is always nice to know there is someone that you can trust out there.


End file.
